[stokedfish]

I think a system with two playlists is a very, very bad idea. I'm pretty sure that having two playlists would confuse the hell out of newbies. One playlist has to be enough. I've never ever seen a mediaplayer with two playlists for different "classes" of songs, such as an "autoplay" list with "autoplay" songs (?!) and a "userqueued" list with "userqueued" songs (?!) - nobody will understand this concept. But that's just my opinion as a former Amarok and new XBMC user. Of course, I could be all wrong...

[rwparris2]

I may be wrong but I don't think jm is suggesting two lists in the way that you're thinking. He's saying internally xbmc would have two playlists (one autogenerated by xbmc, the other of items queued by the user) from which the true playlist would be formed.

The user would still only see and interact with one list...

@snoxbox unless I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, that is exactly how the current system works if you turn off the auto generate stuff. IMHO the playlist should show EXACTLY what is going to be played instead of hiding stuff.

[snoxbox]

@snoxbox unless I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, that is exactly how the current system works if you turn off the auto generate stuff. IMHO the playlist should show EXACTLY what is going to be played instead of hiding stuff.

You are correct. But I need autoplay next item on. I wouild be surprised if there were many user with Autoplay turned off, unless they had turned it off to have better playlist management, as highlighted in this thread.

However, for creating playlists (for parties etc.) I can easily turn off Autoplay, and create the playlist. I had not thought of that before (I didn't realise you could save the Now Playing playlist). My technocripple friends, on the other hand, will not understand this.

[rwparris2]

If your friends spend their time creating playlists on xbmc at your parties... maybe you need to throw better parties

[snoxbox]

If your friends spend their time creating playlists on xbmc at your parties... maybe you need to throw better parties

Ha ha. I'm talking about friends who I have hooked up with xbmc xbox's. I remember the confusion when I put a new build of xbmc on there that changed the playlist behaviour from the old way. I don't think they've fully grasped that yet

[jmarshall]

Indeed, clearly there'd be just the one list displayed to users (and I did say that originally, but have yet again clarified things...).

This list is a combination of the auto-play list and the user-queue list. The key is how to combine them in the most satisfactory manner for the user!

Cheers,
Jonathan

[garyi]

Can I just put my hand up meekly and ask what is wrong with my idea?

If you don't queue anything music plays to the end of the album.

If you do it plays the queued song/songs after the currently playing then stops.

Seems logical enough to me.

[thomash72]

I'd definetly go for jmarshall's option 2! This is the option used in Spotify, and it works like a charm!

This mimics in my opinion a typical user behaviour:
Before you start listening to music, you have made a well thought through decision to listen to 'The Bends' with Radiohead. Halfway into the album, the girlfriend is begging you to put on the song 'Take On Me' by A-ha. You reluctantly obey, but are officially a very happy man when XBMC decides to continue with Radiohead again afterwards. Before you have finished with the album, you have decided to take small detours with the songs 'Comfortably Numb' and 'Ring of Fire' before the playlist comes to and end.
My point is that the first album I'm starting is in most cases a well thought plan. All other changes are in most instances spur of the moment single song changes which I instantly want to have played. After these detours, I want the original "masterplan" listening to the first queued album to finish.

[Mental Block]

I would say option 2, as previous post seems most logical to me. And if I want to not have the whole ablum of the first song in the playlist I choose to enqueue it and not play it.

The only thing I would say that is not clear in your examples Jonathan is if you are selecting the file with the select button (play action) or using the context menu to choose queue? As these would surely have different outcomes?

Which leads me on to my most wanted feature of having the default select action able to be changed from play to enqueue by a setting

[jmarshall]

garyi: Your one is option 1 is it not?

Mental_Block: Yup Play on Song1, Queue on Song2. Play on Song2 would kill the autoplay queue and reconstruct it with the new list.

Default action configurability is certainly something we want - for instance, I want the default action for movies to be show info rather than play.

Interesting you're all thus far going for case 2 - my initial thinking was case 3, but you're convincing me otherwise I think (particularly in the case of play from a playlist)

How does iTunes deal with this I wonder?

Cheers,
Jonathan

[garyi]

I have not used itunes in a long old while but there was the ability to queue an item for playing next. However you had to be in a playlist first. Most annoying!

[csbook]

Yes, that is logical. The point, however is that the "auto play next item" function queues up as well. Consider the following scenario:
Options are:
1. Playback stops. The logic here would be that user-queued songs wipe out auto-queued songs in the now playing list.
2. Playback reverts to the previous auto-queued songs. The logic here is that the auto-queued songs are not cleared, but all that happens is that user-queued songs are prioritized (i.e. insert user-queued items before any auto-queued items).
3. Playback starts continuing on from Song2. The logic here is that the auto-queued songs should always continue on from the last song played.

To me, #3 makes the most sense. I would consider auto play to be the answer to the question of what to play when the playlist is done because playing something is better then playing nothing. If the user wanted to play the whole album from song1, they should have played the whole album.

[2005george]

I would say option 2, as previous post seems most logical to me. And if I want to not have the whole ablum of the first song in the playlist I choose to enqueue it and not play it.

The only thing I would say that is not clear in your examples Jonathan is if you are selecting the file with the select button (play action) or using the context menu to choose queue? As these would surely have different outcomes?

Which leads me on to my most wanted feature of having the default select action able to be changed from play to enqueue by a setting

I would also say being able to change the default select action to enqueue (with a toggle) would be ideal and a relatively easy fix in the interim? The biggest problem everyone has with the system is how easy it is for people to erase a list of songs by accident by using select.

[2005george]

I appriciate any thought from the developers.

However my feeling is if I do not queue an item then the system should simply play the track I selected followed by any more in the album.

If I queue an item then it should be played next and everything stop at the end of the queue.

I agree with this, which is option #1? If I play a song, it plays and the rest of the items in that folder (the album) are 'queued'. But, if I select another song elsewhere, I would want my playlist to only include the 2 songs I've selected, so we're now in playlist mode.

Alternatively, if everyone really likes #2, how about if the person has 'autoplay next items' OFF in the settings (it is ON by default), then everything behaves as a playlist, when you press play on a song, that single song is added. If I press play on another song, it will interrupt the song I am playing, but doesn't 'add to the playlist'. It will only add if I use the 'queue' option. This would never result in an erased list of songs.

[2005george]

garyi: Your one is option 1 is it not?

Mental_Block: Yup Play on Song1, Queue on Song2. Play on Song2 would kill the autoplay queue and reconstruct it with the new list.

Default action configurability is certainly something we want - for instance, I want the default action for movies to be show info rather than play.

Interesting you're all thus far going for case 2 - my initial thinking was case 3, but you're convincing me otherwise I think (particularly in the case of play from a playlist)

How does iTunes deal with this I wonder?

Cheers,
Jonathan

ITunes does this. I can browse my entire library and if I 'Select' a song, it simply plays it, it does not do anything with the song in terms of a playlist. At any time, I can use the context menu to add a song to my playlist, and it will, but it will not interrupt what I am playing in my library, it just builds my playlist. If I go to my playlist view, I can play any song from there, and it will obviously play that item, and continue with my other songs in the playlist. If I go back to library view I can play a song there instead (kind of sampling music before I decide it's worthy of being in my playlist), but at no point will it alter my playlist unless I explicitly use the 'add to playlist' shortcut or context menu.